fellowtraveller

I'm curious too OP. Why are you broadly 'anti-corporate', while living and working in a country that is more or less a market economy? The vast majority of jobs in Canada are generated by the private sector, not by the government where you will soon enjoy a safe, secure career as a teacher. Your wages are ultimately strongly linked to those same corporations. How did you become 'anit-corporate', what influenced that choice?

As I recall, PM Martin promised to place $1.3 million in a trust fund of some sort, as some kind of 'without prejudice' acknowledgement of his Partys complicity in stealing far more than that from all of us. Anybody have any idea if that actually happened, given the desperate state of Liberal finances? Or was this just a pre-campaign promise? Is it normal in a free society for a criminal to select their own punishment?

You state is if the length of the warranites was some measureor indication of quality of the vehicle. It isn't. Long warranties are a marketing tool, nothing more. Companies like Hyundai or Chrysler offer 5 year/100000 warranties to gain market share. If they have to do a few more repairs in that period, they expect to recoup it in the increased sales resulting from the longer warranty.

I think you have misinterpreted my remarks. I really don't think the majority of the problem is with bands or Indians, they are only the final recipients of the cash and are not in any way accontable to me, a taxpayer. The politicians in charge of the department and the civil servants are accountable to me. That is where the focus of the audit should be, not on the end users who take what they are given. It is riduclous to say "we should just honour their privacy". Auditing at the band level is starting at exactly the wrong end. Another load of crap, but more offensive. The 'company' is equally complict if they hand out bribes so they can increase their profits, and greed is certainly not exclusive to any race or ethnic group. In reality, company cars, take home vehicles or fat car allowances are extremely common and available to employees far below the executive level in the private sector. It is a common perk, though I admit that drivers are rare.

There is an easy solution for Toronto: raise taxes to whatever level is required to provide essential services. If people howl, direct their complaints to the provincial government that has refused to dole out their funds in an equitable manner. it is not a fiscal crisis, it is a political problem.

Perhaps, though they are relatively small. I'd start with a public audit of the eternally closed books at Indian Affairs and Northern Developent.

Blame Harper for the chronic non-performance of the Manitoba economy...... How completely predictable.

I'll find arguments about Winnipegs/Manitobas growth and fine management a lot more convincing when they cease suckling fulltime at the federal teat. Despite having plenty of natural resources, cheap power and an educated workforce they have proven completely unable to wean themselves from dependency on other peoples money. That isn't 'anti-regionalism', that is reality. Good analysis overall Kimmy but you overlook a very important element in why Edmontons infrastructure has suffered badly. It is true that mayors like Reimer and Smith did little in the way of planning, and were both basically useless at getting even a fair share from the province. It is also true that Mandel has been the best mayor in decades. But the guy who really set it all back was Lawrence Decore. He was a very good mayor in many ways, but he intropduced a policy of severely restricting capital borrowing for the city. It was a bylaw for many years that edmonton could not have more than a certain percentage of their annual operating budget(5% I think) allocated to debt repayment. This was well intentioned, and likely appropriate in the 80s when Decore was mayor. But.. it was near disastrous when the expansion of the economy started in the mid to late 90s.

Convince me with a link from a reputable source. Turkey has several opponents to EU membership within the EU, not least of which is France.

Yes, I can see how you'd be proud of this : "Winnipeg 2006 business tax increases capped at 15%" That must be a significant economic advance in Manitoba, kind of like wrestling the price of a loaf of bread down from $90 to $80. And are you seriously suggesting that splitting education tax from municipal property tax would somehow be progressive? oh, I see, getting two bills for the same huge total is much better than a single huge bill. It's straight from the Little Red Book Revisited, by Gary Doer. Jebus help us. I

I'm not used to seeing racism quite so overtly. It is always illuminating when this topic comes up. I rarely learn anything about the actual situation, but I do learn something about my fellow citizens both white and brown. Unfortuantely what I learn is usually really ugly.

After reading your stuff for a couple of years, I would agree that Canada is not the country you imagine it to be. In particular, your usual condescending comments on how the ROC perceives Quebec and Quebecois culture are frequently completely wrong and -ironically- provincial. Note that times have changed. At one time, much of the military came in the form of Western farm boys. The 'traditon' was that the pooerst segments of our nation contributed the most soldiers, and that distinction of being poorest has rotated through the country over the decades, with perhaps only Ontario never contributing a proportionate share. Being poor and needing a job won't get you into todays military though. You need education, desire, maybe some experience and language helps. They have more quality applicants than they can handle much of the time. Dumb does not cut it anymore, many military jobs work with advanced technology that requires both intelligence and the ability to learn.

Since Winnipeg has had nine consecutive years of tax freezes and is in the process of removing its business tax, perhaps Edmonton could learn a lesson. How big was the tax increase in Edmonton last year? 5%? 8%? Nine years of freezes after decades of overpayment and you're bragging about that? Winniopeg : The City That Never Grows It doesn't change the reality that property taxes are still huge in Winnipeg. Are the civic services any better? No. Do citizens enjoy a better quality of life? No. Is there any practical reason for the difference other than your abiding and deep love of Big Guvmint? What will you replace the recent big increase in Winnepeg bsuness tax with? One thing for sure, business knows it isn't welcome in Manitoba, or they would have invested already there. It seems odd, all that transfer money pouring into Manitoba and thus to Winnipeg, and atxes still massive. No wonder all the smart ones have left.

So the Soveriegn Mounted Police will handle all Criminal Code of Canada issues, and each province will create their own police force to hand out parking and speeding tickets. yeah , that makes real sense. I can see the OPP and QPP jumping all over that bandwagon.

I'm sure Edmponton and Alberta have a lot to learn from Winnipeg and Manitoba on fiscal management. Property taxes in Edmonton are roughly half what they are in Winnipeg.

Are the Van Doos now part of a Quebec military? There is a large base near my home in Alberta, but I've never heard anybody think of them having anything to do with the province other than living here. They are a national resource.

how the police treat one of their own Constable Slemko gets shafted......... "University of Alberta criminologist Bill Pitt, a former RCMP officer, is familiar with Slemko's work as a blood-spatter expert. He said the charges against him have nothing to do with the quality of his analysis. "He has an outstanding record and is held in very high esteem around the world," Pitt said. "His mistake is that he breached the unwritten code that you never give evidence against another police officer and he has been made to pay for that by the EPS." Pitt said that, in theory, the police are supposed to be objective and unbiased in their gathering and presentation of evidence. But in reality, they always side with the prosecution. "They won't like to hear that, but it's true," Pitt said. "Everyone wants to say they are unbiased, but the fact is, it is about winning. It's about supporting the prosecution. It's about getting a conviction." Slemko's stand for objectivity, while laudable, can't succeed within the existing police culture and he will continue to be an outsider, in constant conflict with his superiors and other officers, he said. "Joe is a standup guy but he is caught in a web of politics. Unfortunately, he is paid by the EPS, he is bound by their conditions of employment and if he doesn't like it, he should leave. With his qualifications and reputation, he would make far more as a private consultant anyway." So why doesn't he just quit? "I am still proud to be a police officer and I am not going to let them win," the 46-year-old Slemko said. "And I want my 25-year pension. I am not going to jeopardize my family's financial welfare just because there is risk and stress involved in standing up for what you believe is right.""

Nope...just can't explain why the Japanese system is so much better than Canada's if one uses life expectancy as the yardstick. And guess what..they are not your favorite "whites"...LOL! Didn't think you'd give up that easy. Just cannot think of any reasons why Canadians live longer, other than it has something vaguely Japanese ? Average lifespans of scores or hundreds of millions of people are hard to dismess, but you just breeze on by , spouting a load of crap and ignoring facts..... so please don't ask me to take you seriously . And I don't know what you are on about 'whites', unless you are now also contending that the 40 million people in the US without insurance of any kind, and the scores of millions that are underinsured, are not disproportionately non-Cacausian?

You can have those extra three years and then some....we're not interested in commie health care. Besides, a lot of that extra "lifespan" is spent consuming American culture..LOL! Go back to your ignorant racist rants.... Just can't explain that three years extra life, eh? By the way, you've been wanking on about the medical coverage you get in the military system. Exactly what happens if you have any sort of chronic medical condition as an active duty soldier. Heart or liver disease, diabetes, serious form of cancer.......? You'd be discharged, dumped on the street, and left to go looking for an insurance company that was interested in taking on a person with health problems. Plenty of takers for those cases, right? HMOs just love unemployed, sick people, right? In Canada, if the military decides you're unfit for service, you're gone - same as the US. But of course, your medical conditions wouldn't matter because a provincial plan would cover you..... But i digress. Tell me how the commies in Canada manage to keep their people alive longer with such an inferior system?

80 years average lifespan in Canada. 77 average in USA. Essentially the same culture, diet , lifestyle. Significantly different levels of health care. No explanation other than ' My cat gets better health care than that, and he also has no insurance.' Like I said, the classic "I got mine". What an ugly, selfish point of view.

Ah yes, the Noble Pearson Approach..... used to work pretty well.... But what if the locals don't want to be peaceful, what if they want to kill you? What if there is no peace to be kept? Walk away? is that your 'solution'? Would you like to return to the time just a few short years ago when Afghanistan was a feudal theocracy, when women were not permitted education, when over 2 million women and children had fled to refugee camps. Or would you have your allies shed their blood, so you could move in after for the reconstruction?

Baloney. White, educated, middle class and employed-with-benefits baloney. The working poor, poor and even many middle class insured people have little or no access to preventative medicine because they simply cannot afford it. Going to a doctor only when you are desperately ill does not make you 'happy'. But don't take my word for it, here is some actual information:explain this then. Canadians live significantly longer on average than Americans despite very similar cultures, diets and liefestyles. We are just as fat and sedentary. We live longer. Overall better health care for all citizens is a reason. If you are rich in the USA, maybe you can get your knee rebuilt quicker. But for far, far too many Americans you simply cannot afford to find out if that little rectal bleed is a little problem until it becomes a big tumour - and too late. Or tumor if you must. I'm a free market kind of guy, but it baffles me that a society supposedly as fair and compassionate as the US claims to be can just leave so many with so little, and be proud of it. "I got mine, so screw you Jack." Odd , and not what I would consider representative.

Oh come on now, that only applies to those Americans that can afford coverage and in large part to those who have their premiums paid for by their employers. The 40 million Americans that are uninsured and the many more that are underinsured are not 'happy '. That isn't what I said. I said we would never have enough money to keep everybody alive forever, which is waht the Friends of Medicare insist happened in the mythical Good Old Days. Between enhanced life spans and massive costs of technology/drugs, we'll never have enough $.

Taliban Jack? Nope. Neville Chamberlain. Neville Jack The resemblance is uncanny.

No thanks, but feel free to start another thread if you wish. The question is straightforward, are you having difficulty understanding it? The two questions are two different topics, although they share common themes of bigotry and intolerance.